


Love is a Verb

by kribban



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, M/M, Not Happy, Transporter Malfunction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2019-12-11
Packaged: 2021-02-18 12:36:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21761002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kribban/pseuds/kribban
Summary: After a transporter accident, Pavel performs love.
Relationships: Pavel Chekov/Leonard "Bones" McCoy
Comments: 5
Kudos: 46





	Love is a Verb

Leonard didn't look up when he heard the doors to his quarters open. If he was trying to postpone his disappointment, or if he'd just grown detached; he didn't know.

But what he did know was that he used to be excited at Pavel coming home. 

He kept his hands busy, asked over his shoulder. ”Good shift?” It was a polite enough question. 

The other man stopped a few feet away, hands in his pockets. Leonard didn't have to see his face to know it was completely blank. 

Pasha had been so full of life.

”It was uneventful.” Pavel's tone was even. ”I have already put it out of my mind. Shall I prepare dinner?”

Twenty years of practicing medicine had taught Leonard to know what futility looked like. He had seen the scans, even though he'd had to persuade the head psychiatrist at Starfleet Medical that he was emotionally stable enough to see them.

What he had seen had destroyed any last sliver of hope he had carried. The transporter accident had permanently destroyed his husband's ability to feel emotion. Any emotion. 

His intellect was intact, as were his memories. He had no violent tendencies and his upbringing, as well as his Starfleet training, had provided him with a moral code that he was strongly motivated to follow. He was, to put it bluntly, a high-functioning psychopath.

Strangely enough, that wasn't a problem for the Admiralty. An officer who was physically unable to be emotionally compromised was seen as an asset. 

They had still put him through charm school, though. Taught him to act as normally as possible around his fellow crew, how to fake concern and smile convincingly when needed. 

Pavel had even tried his newfound technique on Leonard, but Leonard had told him where to shove it. He didn't need or want an illusion.

After dinner, they cleared the table. Pavel did some work on his PADD and then he fucked Leonard in their freshly made up bed until they both orgasmed. 

It was the only kind of sex they had these days. 

The first time Leonard had fucked his husband after the accident, the differences had been so jarring that he had almost thrown up. 

Pasha had been a demanding and enthusiastic bottom, loud and responsive. They'd usually made love face-to-face so Leonard could watch Pasha's reactions, see the pleasure play out on his face. Kiss him. 

After the accident, it had been like fucking a computer. 

This way, Leonard didn't have to do any of the work. He could just lie there and wait for his orgasm. 

”I didn't hurt you, did I?” 

Pavel had a curious expression on his face that Leonard recognized as an assessment in progress. He was assessing if there were any further tasks to perform.

”No, just thinking 'bout something,” Leonard sighed and wiped the come from his stomach. ”It was very satisfying, thank you.”

”That is good.” Pavel didn't say he was pleased, because Leonard had asked him to never lie to him.

He hoped that Pavel found it a relief that he didn't have to pretend around Leonard. A relief in the most basic sense, the absence of effort. It was one of the few hopes Leonard still allowed himself to keep.

He let Pavel take the first shower.

While waiting for his turn, he fantasized about a life without Pavel. Maybe on another ship. He could meet someone, maybe. Someone who reminded him of what Pasha had been like, or maybe someone who wouldn't remind him at all.

He was still good-looking by Earth standards, and he could re-learn how to be charming. Jim could probably teach him. Leonard knew he wouldn't be able to love this much again, but he could still fall _in_ love, be someone's boyfriend. Maybe. He'd been a divorcee before, he could be one again.

The sonic was turned off and Pavel emerged from the shower with a towel around his waist.

”Do you want a divorce?” Leonard asked.

Pavel looked unmoved but lifted his head to meet Leonard's gaze, like he'd been trained to. Maybe the situation called for it. ”No.” No shrug. No unnecessary eye-movements. 

”Because you don't want anything, is that right?”

”In the way that you categorize desire, no. I don't desire or want anything.” 

”Then why are you still with me?”

”We have been over this, Leonard,” Pavel said calmly.

The old Pasha would have rolled his eyes. Or started yelling.

”You are my husband. I am fully committed to keeping you safe and happy.”

Leonard didn't doubt that Pavel would kill, or maybe even die, to protect him. Still, it wasn't enough. He swallowed thickly, wrapping the sheets a little tighter around himself. ”Because you feel a moral obligation towards me?”

Pavel nodded. ”Because it is the right thing to do. You are a good person and you deserve to be cared for. I have promised to be with you until one of us dies, and the accident doesn't change this. I will not break my promise.”

”And when I do die, you won't miss me?” Leonard was seventeen years older. He had never doubted that his husband would outlive him, and he had always taken solace in that fact.

”I will notice your absence, and it will probably take a few weeks for me to acclimate, but then, no, I probably won't think of you very often. But you'll be dead, so it won't matter to you.”

That sounded like something Spock would have said; back when they'd first met him. But Spock had emotions, powerful ones, that he chose to suppress in order to be a better person. A couple of years ago, Leonard had felt bad for Uhura, but now he knew how lucky she was. She was fiercely and passionately loved, even if her husband didn't always show this.

”I'm sorry I'm going on about this. None of this is your fault. I just wish... Call me sentimental, but sometimes I wish you could love me the way you used to.” 

Pavel seemed to ponder this and didn't accept Leonard's apology. ”It's not correct to say I don't love you, Leonard. I perform love for you every day. I provide encouragement, affection, sex. Physical protection when necessary. Why should it matter that my brain no longer processes chemicals the way it once did?” 

It was a little bit more complicated than that, but Pavel wasn't a doctor. Maybe Leonard was making things _too_ complicated. Pavel was good to him, and the only reason he was so blunt was that Leonard had asked him not to pretend. Maybe, if he asked for it, Pavel could learn how to fake emotion perfectly. Maybe he could learn how to moan and gasp and argue and fake a smile that reached his eyes... 

”What if I wanted you to leave me?”

”Then I would do it.” Pavel replied without hesitation.

”And if I wanted you to stay with me for the rest of my life?”

”I would.” No hesitation there, either.

It was like the transporter had cut Pavel open, sucked out anything resembling a human person and left behind a perfectly functioning robot that was programmed to obey Leonard's every command.

He would get everything he ever asked for from it, except for that which he desperately wanted. 

”And you really don't care either way?”

Pavel didn't flinch or smile or show any kind of reaction. ”You should do whatever makes you happy, Leonard. I will give you anything you want.”

Leonard wasn't a divorcee, he was a widower.

”Well, right now I want a cuddle. C'mere.” He held out his arms.

”Of course,” Pavel replied immediately and joined him on the bed.

Leonard could get a shower tomorrow. He'd always liked Pasha's smell on him, and it was the one thing that had stayed the same. 

He arranged them so that he was the little spoon and then he ordered the lights off. He reached behind him to find Pavel's arm and wrap it around his waist. For a moment, he allowed himself to imagine that Pavel was the one who had initiated the gesture.

**Author's Note:**

> A couple of weeks ago I read some accounts from psychopaths about the relationships they have with family and friends, which inspired this story. It's rather bleak, a break from my fluffy OTP-fics, because it unnerved me so much. Consider this story my personal therapy. 
> 
> Title is from a Massive Attack song.


End file.
